I think all believers should be readers; that’s why we challenge the mens’ groups in our church to read a book a month. But it can sometimes be a temptation – especially for me – to ingest large amounts of information without truly digesting any of it. That’s why this challenge by Puritan preacher Thomas Brooks pricked my conscience a little bit:
Remember, it is not hasty reading—but serious meditating upon holy and heavenly truths, that make them prove sweet and profitable to the soul. It is not the bee’s touching of the flower, which gathers honey—but her abiding for a time upon the flower, which draws out the sweet. It is not he who reads most—but he who meditates most, who will prove the choicest, sweetest, wisest and strongest Christian. – from Precious Remedies Against Satan’s Devices (1652)